Listening
by climbergirlio
Summary: It's the second anniversary of her mother's death and Dairine seeks comfort. Set after GWP.


**A/N: My interpretation of Dairine dealing with her mother's death. Only the plot belongs to me. The rest is all Diane Duane's.**

Dairine awoke to the bright light of day. She hadn't bothered to set her alarm, she wouldn't be expected to go to school anyways. Not today. Never today. She trudged down to the table alone. She sat, hungry, but unable to find the will to eat. Nita and Dad wouldn't be here. Together they had unofficially decided that they each dealt with today separately.

Nita, Dairine knew, would visit Kit. Aunt Annie was alray either here or coming later for her dad. Last year, all Dairine had done was call the school shrink. She sat there, wishing she had someone to comfort her, too.

She trudged back upstairs, to her room. There, she picked one of the few photographs she valued dearly, it was displayed prominently. Dairine and her mother, from just before she had gotten sick. The tears came to Dairine's eyes, and she let them fall. The other pictures that were here included one of the whole family, and one of her and Roshaun. She was sitting there, depressedly staring at all three photos when she realized that there was someone who she could at least visit. Maybe he wouldn't be all that comforting, but it would be a nice dose of normalcy.

Dairine made her way to the basement, where a worldgate was located, courtesy of Sker'. She didn't have to even put in the coordinates, Spot did that for her.

Dairine appeared in Wellakh to see Roshaun and Lady Miril studying something with great interest. They both looked up when Dairine appeared, however, in a bit of surprise.

"Dhairine? Are you alright?" Lady Miril asked, sounding concerned.

Apparently Dairine did look as bad as she felt. As Lady Miril was coming over, however, to Dairine's great embarrassment, she sank to the ground and started sobbing. Lady Miril crouched beside her, and Roshaun was hurriedly making his way over as well. The Wellakhit exchanged a glance of confusion, apparently neither of them knew quite what to do. They had no idea what was wrong.

Eventually, Dairine had calmed down.

She forced out a watery apology, "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have come here."

Dairine began to stand up, with the intention of getting back to the worldgate and going home. However, both Lady Miril and Roshaun forced her to stay seated. They exchanged another quick look.

"Dhairine, can we move you to the sofa?" Lady Miril questioned gently.

Dairine nodded, and allowed herself to be led to the sofa where she sat, primly.

"Dhairine, tekeh, what is the matter."

Dairine simply shook her head, tears forming again. Saying it hurt too much, especially today. She missed her mother so much. She missed the way she danced around the house, and the way she had looked at Dairine. Coming to Wellakh might have been a mistake, seeing Lady Miril and Roshaun, together, happy, was unbearable. She felt wicked for feeling like that, but it was practically torture.

Spot's voice came up from the floor, "Perhaps I could converse with one of you outside the room? I can tell you why Dairine is upset, but not here, that only makes it worse."

Dairine was rushed by a sudden love for Spot. He was doing all he could to help her today. Roshaun stood, awkwardly and followed Spot out of the room.

* * *

Roshaun was completely and utterly confused when Dairine of all people appeared in his room (not that that didn't happen, but usually she warned him) and then, to his great surprise started crying. This was not the confident Dairine he knew. Hadn't he always wished Dairine would make herself more approachable and show him more about herself, so he could actually talk to her for once? And now, here she was, as vulnerable as he had ever seen her, and it felt terrible. He had absolutely no idea what was wrong.

Now, Roshaun was following Spot into his study/general purpose room.

"Today is the second anniversary of Betty Callahan's walk amongst the Powers. Dairine came because she felt alone, Nita has Kit and Harry had their Aunt Annie, but Dairine doesn't know who to talk to. Last year, she had a phone call with the school shrink."

Dear Aethyrs how had he not seen that earlier? And what was a shrink?

"What do I do?" Roshaun asked.

If it was possible for a computer to shrug, Spot was doing that. "Be there. Comfort her, but don't say something that sounds insensitive. Perhaps a comforting hug?"

Suddenly, without meaning to be, Roshaun was back on the night he got rescued, the last time they had hugged for more than the few seconds of a strictly platonic hug. Dairine was standing over his couch, concern plain in her features. He had teased her about how long it had taken her to find him, and as a reward he had gotten a pillow to the face. Then, Dairine had practically tackled him in a hug. He, of course had hugged her right back, and they had stayed at way for quite sometime, just holding each other. He knew that for Dairine it was simply a reassurance that he was actually there. For him it had meant so much more. His body had been filled with sparks, hotter and more noticeable than they had been every time Dairine had touched him before he had vanished. Recently, he had gotten accustomed to the hand holding Dairine's people were fond of. She could take his hand and he would feel elated, but not quite as elated as he had been once upon a time. He understood that on her planet, this was customary, the pulling of people ways by the hand, and he had grown used to the sensation of it.

He shook himself back to reality. He could deal with his feelings for her later. Right now, he needed to be her friend. She needed him.

He entered the room. Dairine was still in that terribly rigid position. She was obviously holding herself together with large difficulty. As he entered the room, she moved to stand up, probably to try and leave again.

"Dhairine," Roshaun said, concern and sadness purposefully evident in his voice.

Then, Roshaun crossed the room and sat next to her on the couch, circling her with his arms. Tears leaked silently from her eyes, as she rested her head against him. He was very ashamed to realize that he was enjoying her leaning on him. He should not enjoy this in any way! Lady Miril sat on Dairine's other side, and she too hugged Dairine.

Dairine wiped her eyes with her hand, "I just miss her so much, especially today. Sorry for intruding, I'll leave now."

"Why ever would you do that? Leave when you most need someone else?" Lady Miril asked.

Roshaun knew that Dairine probably wanted to leave because she hated them seeing her weak and crying. She did not like feeling dependent upon someone else. That was something Roshaun could relate to.

Much to Roshaun's surprise, Dairine turned away and said, "because I've always spent today alone." There was a bit of stunned silence, but Dairine continued, "being with Nita or Dad is hard, since there is a third person there as well. None of us can talk to anyone else in the house. And pretty much Nita and Dad were the only people I trusted enough to talk to."

"Oh, Dhairine tekeh!" said Lady Miril with anguish.

She might have said more, but there was a sharp knock at the door. Dairine gave him a nod to show that she was fine with him answering the door. He glanced at her. Her eyes were puffy and her face was streaked with red, but she honestly looked beautiful. He stood and went over to the door, opening it to a serving girl.

"Sunlord, the Sunlord-That-Was requests the Sister of the Sun for a confidential meeting of important confidential wizardry matters."

"Very well," Roshaun stepped back from the door. The serving girl looked shocked at Lady Miril sitting with her arms around a very obviously distraught alien.

"My Lady Miril, I am sure you heard the request. Will you be joining the Sunlord-That-Was or giving me assistance?" Roshaun nearly winced when he realized he had made it sound like he needed assistance with Dairine.

The serving girl's eyebrows were nearly through the roof.

"Tekeh?"

"Your duties call, My Lady. I should not endeavor to be any more trouble to you or the Guarantor than I already have been," Dairine said. Her control was great, even as she struggled to keep it. Roshaun could feel what was going on inside her head, and he wondered how she could manage to pull off sounding as close to normal as she did.

"You have caused us no trouble and do not wish for you to leave," said Roshaun. He mentally winced again. This serving girl was going to cause quite the gossip storm, and it would be all his fault.

"I take my leave Royal Son," Lady Miril told him, and swept out of the room followed by the serving girl.

As soon as the door closed, Dairine let down most of her facade. Roshaun went back and sat by her on the couch. The silence between them was profound. It was the first time Roshaun had absolutely no idea what to say to Dairine. Sure, there had been times when he had thought that, but then he had always come up with the answer. What did you say to the girl who always was so confident and passionate, but was currently seeking confidence and unbearably sad?

Finally he chose something that he hoped would be neutral, "do you want me to get you some beverage or something, perhaps?"

"Do your people have tea? I have a massive headache and my throat hurts."

Having encountered tea on Dairine's planet, he knew they had something very similar. He took out his Aethyr and used it to order what he thought would best suite Dairine. It came a short while later, and he set it on the couch between them. Dairine briefly eyed the spices the cups had come with, and picked all the exact ones Roshaun would have. They both added these things to their beverages. Roshaun sipped his lightly, but Dairine was mostly stirring hers.

They had both sat there for a bit, until Roshaun had finished. Dairine's still was mostly full, but she had had some.

"Her name was Betty Callahan. She was a professional ballet dancer."

Roshaun was surprised that Dairine was telling him this, but he wasn't sure that she wanted a response. Sometimes, people just wanted you to listen.

"She used to cook for us, all sorts of different things. It was her hobby, but also her therapy. If we came home to lots of food, we knew that there was trouble."

Dairine pauses for a while, absentmindedly stirring her tea.

"She dealt with punishing us for dad. For a long while afterwards, Nita took almost all her responsibilities up." Dairine was crying again, softly, "she felt guilty. We both did. Nita tried an intervention, and it went horribly wrong. She's never said it, but I think maybe Nita would have had to give her life to save Mom, and Mom didn't let her. I blamed Nita for everything that had happened. Slowly, I began to lose my wizardry." Dairine took a gulping breath, but continued on, "then, one night Nita came into my room. I yelled at her and screamed for her to go away. She didn't leave. She told me Mom wouldn't want me to give this up because she was gone. I told her I didn't care because Mom wasn't here. She kept sitting there. As she sat there, I realized how brave my big sister was. She faced the Lone Power in his home territory, tried to sacrifice herself to a shark, saved me on my Ordeal, made the right connections to win the war against the Lone Power with the Irish, and then had tried to do something much more personal, with only herself to blame if it didn't work. Save my mother." Dairine looked at Roshaun briefly, but then broke eye contact again.

She began quieter, "and that night, she came into my room and took my anger and my blame and my hate of her, and she accepted it. That night, she saved me. I accepted what had happened, and the wizardry came back. And even though every other day of the year, when we miss my Mom we don't shed tears over it, we allow ourselves one day to be sad about the whole big event."

Dairine swallowed and shook slightly. Roshaun took her into his arms once more, running his hands through her hair, in what he hoped was a comforting gesture. Dairine pulled back.

"Thank you, Roshaun. Thanks for listening. It was really helpful to talk about."

"You are welcome Dhairine."

She leaned back against him, and he let her cry, now knowing the story behind why. He said nothing about the fact that she hadn't had anything to eat the whole time she was here. He expected that today she wasn't going to eat. He said nothing about the fact that she might be missed at home. He said nothing about any of his feelings for her. Today, his purpose was just to listen.

 **A/N: That was kinda sad so now I'm going to do a more fun Dairine randomly shows up on Wellakh and causes a commotion.**


End file.
